Pathfinder Society in Denmark (or Tidings from the Viking Lodge)

Monday, April 9, 2012

Illustration by J.P. Targete

Last month, we highlighted the UK and Venture-Captain David Harrison's efforts to grow Pathfinder Society there. We now shift our focus to the north and the land of the Vikings. Venture-Captain Diego Winterborg's report on Pathfinder Society in Denmark was a very interesting read for me and I hope all of you find it informative as well.

Denmark is a Scandinavian country made up of a peninsula that is geographically joined to Northern Germany, called Jutland, and a large number of islands southwest of Sweden, the largest of which are Funen and Zealand. Its size and population are roughly the equivalent of Tennessee. Greenland and the Faroe Islands are part of the Danish Rigsfællesskab, or Commonwealth.

The Pathfinder Society Organized Play campaign made its arrival in Denmark in February 2010 when a few friends and I went to a small RPG convention in the town of Odense. Danish RPG conventions are, by their nature, rather small events, and are largely dominated by indie games and a lot of deep-immersion, psychodrama players, so it goes without saying that we made quite an impression with our loud combat-heavy, dice-rolling RPG, which we ran in the convention's common area, for all to see. While we fully expected a lot of people would be provoked by our very different approach to gaming, it gave us an excellent opportunity to engage them in a discussion about the merits of “our game.” By the end of the convention, what started out as a four-man event had drawn in a score of new players and totaled some 10 sessions.

During the summer of 2010, we arranged a game day in honor of then Pathfinder Society Campaign Coordinator, Joshua J. Frost, who was making Copenhagen his first stop on his European tour. His tour culminated at Paizo Con UK that year. Frost was very keen on having a solid PFS presence in Europe, and in Denmark I volunteered for the position of regional coordinator. That is how Denmark, being a small country by most standards, was fortunate enough to be assigned a Venture-Captain with the first round of selections, when the program was born in the fall of 2010.

Early in the fall of 2010, the first game days were planned at the game store, Fantask, in Copenhagen. While the venue is very small and only allows for a single session every other weekend, it has been very reliable and has been a constant for over a year.

Pathfinder Society has since had annual representation in Denmark's two largest gaming conventions, Viking Con and Fastaval, as well as other smaller conventions and game days in and around Copenhagen.

This winter Jacob Trier, who had just recovered from serious illness, volunteered for the position as Venture-Lieutenant based in Jutland. This addition will ensure a stronger presence in the western half of Denmark. By next month, regular store games are expected to start in Dragon's Lair in the city of Aarhus and this year's Fastaval convention will have a locally based Pathfinder Society coordinator.

In 2011, Viking Con and Fastaval had nine Pathfinder Society tables each. This was satisfactory as a very small core of players and GMs drove our continued interest in Pathfinder. This year, however, we are seeing the emergence of more private gaming groups and expect to have a growing GM base for 2012's events.

Spilfestival, on March 24, features Blood under Absalom as its highlighted event. This marks a milestone for the Pathfinder Society in Denmark as it is the first time a Pathfinder Society multi-table special will be run here.

Fastaval, April 4–8: Danish Pathfinder players will get their first opportunity to play the Season 3 exclusive, The Cyphermage Dilemma. We have 15 tables scheduled over the four days.

Viking Lodge Game Days are planned for July 28–29. Started in 2010, this is fast becoming a Danish tradition. The plans for this event are still in the planning stages. Participants can count on being among a good number of Paizo fans and having a full day of Pathfinder Society games, followed by a night out in Copenhagen afterward.

Viking Con 31, October 19—21, is Denmark's largest gaming convention and we will certainly have something special to offer to Pathfinder Society players.

Danish Pathfinder Society events are also receiving a measure of Paizo convention support, which hopefully will increase interest and send a strong signal that Paizo pays attention to its international fans.

To facilitate continued growth of Pathfinder Society, we are making plans with public libraries to start having monthly game days. The success of this plan is still dependant on GMs volunteering to run games. Initially, I am planning game days in Copenhagen libraries only. But, the public library network in Denmark is rather extensive and Pathfinder Society has the potential to reach veritably every Danish roleplayer interested in participating in an organized play campaign.

This brings me to one of my most important points about roleplaying in Denmark. The RPGA and Living Greyhawk never established themselves in our country, and the very concept of an organized play campaign is very new to Danish gamers. According to my friendly local gaming store, Pathfinder RPG sales are increasing, and continued convention scheduling and internet exposition is bound to draw players into the fold one handful at a time. While events to date remain small, we always know we will be among friends as we strive to continue increasing our numbers.

If you live in Denmark or Southern Sweden and are interested in trying out Pathfinder Society Organized Play, you can keep up with our growing community on our website, pathfindersociety.dk. Danish convention organizers and store owners interested in hosting Pathfinder Society events should contact me at pathfinder.society@live.dk.

Diego WinterborgVenture-Captain

If you are in another country and do not have a Venture-Captain, but think you can do as good a job as Diego did above, please do not hesitate to send me a write-up about Pathfinder Society play in your area of the world and include some photos.

I'm curious about what language you use at the table. I have no idea if the Pathfinder books have been translated into Danish, but I have a strong suspicion that the PFS scenarios are not. When you run games in Denmark, are the players all English speaking, or do you translate things on the fly?

If you do game in English, does the language barrier hinder your attempts to find players at all? If not, what challenges do you face trying to translate things yourself?

I'm curious about what language you use at the table. I have no idea if the Pathfinder books have been translated into Danish, but I have a strong suspicion that the PFS scenarios are not. When you run games in Denmark, are the players all English speaking, or do you translate things on the fly?

If you do game in English, does the language barrier hinder your attempts to find players at all? If not, what challenges do you face trying to translate things yourself?

Pathfinder RPG has not yet been translated into Danish (at least not as far I know).

I can only speak for myself and the 5 players in my Pathfinder Society group, of course, but when we get together to play RPGs (whether it's Pathfinder RPG or any other RPG), we speak Danish. Game mechanics and flavor text are done in English. For instance, Armor Class is Armor Class and not rustningsklasse as it would be if we translated it into Danish.

I'm curious about what language you use at the table. I have no idea if the Pathfinder books have been translated into Danish, but I have a strong suspicion that the PFS scenarios are not. When you run games in Denmark, are the players all English speaking, or do you translate things on the fly?

If you do game in English, does the language barrier hinder your attempts to find players at all? If not, what challenges do you face trying to translate things yourself?

We game in Danish, with the occasional piece of description or flavor text being read aloud in English. No Pathfinder materials, books or otherwise, have been translated into Danish, but virtually all Danes understand English at a very high level, and most GM's can translate on the fly.

In my experience, the biggest barrier to getting more players is not the language, but the lack of prior experience with the concept of Organized Play that Diego touches upon in the end of his article. But we are doing all we can to change that.

I just got back from Fastaval, one of the events mentioned above. We managed 15 sessions and handed out a bunch of new Pathfinder Society numbers. Hopefully, within a year or two, PFS is going to be a natural part of most Danish cons.

I'm curious about what language you use at the table. I have no idea if the Pathfinder books have been translated into Danish, but I have a strong suspicion that the PFS scenarios are not. When you run games in Denmark, are the players all English speaking, or do you translate things on the fly?

If you do game in English, does the language barrier hinder your attempts to find players at all? If not, what challenges do you face trying to translate things yourself?

We game in Danish, with the occasional piece of description or flavor text being read aloud in English. No Pathfinder materials, books or otherwise, have been translated into Danish, but virtually all Danes understand English at a very high level, and most GM's can translate on the fly.

In my experience, the biggest barrier to getting more players is not the language, but the lack of prior experience with the concept of Organized Play that Diego touches upon in the end of his article. But we are doing all we can to change that.

I just got back from Fastaval, one of the events mentioned above. We managed 15 sessions and handed out a bunch of new Pathfinder Society numbers. Hopefully, within a year or two, PFS is going to be a natural part of most Danish cons.

/Jacob - VL, Denmark-Jutland.

I'll add my few cents to the mix here.

I recently moved to Denmark from Iceland. And despite a heavy Danish tradition back home (after all we used to be a part of the Commonwealth) my Danish is rusty as hell. I wasn't sure if I would be able to play much at all here in my new home in Copenhagen because of this language barrier.

I knew of the local game store, Fantask (which is incredible btw), and knew that I could at least get some information about groups there. The pointed me to the Society and Diego, and truth be told, with some reservation (because of the language barrier at the table) I contacted him.

To his credit he accommodated me and I've had the privilege of attending a game at Fantask and the Spilefesteval where he oversaw "Blood Under Absalom". I count myself incredibly fortunate of having been able to join the Society here: the people are cool, fun to play with and generous with their time and translations ;).

Really though I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you Diego and highlight the awesome work you and the rest of the people in the Society are doing. Thanks!

As Jacob says, most people play in Danish with a mixture of English thrown in. I ran one of the games at Fastaval, where we had an English player join us, and nobody had a problem with running the game in English (with the occasional "what is x in English" or "could you repeat the description"), and great fun was had. We played Visions of Betrayal, and either because of my years in Ireland or just because I like whiskey, most of the characters ended up sounding like Irish sailors.

To my knowledge, the only D&D based roleplaying game that was ever translated into Danish was original Dungeons & Dragons (Red and Blue box). The costs are simply too high (high translation salaries and high taxes) and the need too small to make it profitable.

First of all id like to second Jacob Trier, the lack of translations are by no means a barrier for us danes. In my own case, ive been playing roleplaying games since i was ten or so. Having to read english rulebooks ive quickly become very apt at english. Some have a little trouble translating on the go, but in my experience, it is quite common to use the english vocabulary associated with the game. Most gamin sessions in denmark will feature a certain mix of danish spreckled with english words like armor class as mentioned above, saving throws, perception etc...
Most danish gamers while they might be a bit slow or searching for words would probably be more than capable of running sessions entirely in english. So foreign gamers fear not we vikings are will gladly play along with you guys if you so happens to be in denmark, with a raising need for society xD

I actually visited Fantask in Copenhagen years ago (before PF). Copenhagen is a great city. The people are very friendly and trusting, spoke English, and everyone is in shape since people bike everywhere. Anyway I highly recommend the city and the friendly people of Denmark!

I actually visited Fantask in Copenhagen years ago (before PF). Copenhagen is a great city. The people are very friendly and trusting, spoke English, and everyone is in shape since people bike everywhere. Anyway I highly recommend the city and the friendly people of Denmark!

+1. I visited Copenhagen for a week back in 1998. It is the cleanest big city I've ever been to and the fountains and plazas are amazing. I hope to get back the some day.

Copenhagen is truly a great city, and people are very friendly. I would love to visit it some time again :) . The only role-playing community I saw was at Lyngby, Faraos Cigarer. Shame on me that I've missed Fantask :(

Spilfestival, on March 24, features Blood under Absalom as its highlighted event. This marks a milestone for the Pathfinder Society in Denmark as it is the first time a Pathfinder Society multi-table special will be run here.

Fastaval, April 4–8: Danish Pathfinder players will get their first opportunity to play the Season 3 exclusive, The Cyphermage Dilemma. We have 15 tables scheduled over the four days.

Viking Lodge Game Days are planned for July 28–29. Started in 2010, this is fast becoming a Danish tradition. The plans for this event are still in the planning stages. Participants can count on being among a good number of Paizo fans and having a full day of Pathfinder Society games, followed by a night out in Copenhagen afterward.

Viking Con 31, October 19—21, is Denmark's largest gaming convention and we will certainly have something special to offer to Pathfinder Society players.

I'm curious about what language you use at the table. I have no idea if the Pathfinder books have been translated into Danish, but I have a strong suspicion that the PFS scenarios are not. When you run games in Denmark, are the players all English speaking, or do you translate things on the fly?

If you do game in English, does the language barrier hinder your attempts to find players at all? If not, what challenges do you face trying to translate things yourself?

Language has never been an issue. Most Danes speak English rather well. No Pathfinder products have to date been translated to Danish and I suspect if such an effort was made, it would only make sense with regard to the Beginner Box.

We generally run games in Danish. Often we choose to read flavor texts aloud in English but more often than not we translate them on the fly or just paraphrase them. Of course GMs should always make notes about key information.

Twice I have had requests for games to be run in English to accommodate a non-Danish speaker. The Danish players where OK with this and the games ran smoothly.

English speakers in Denmark are hereby encouraged to reach out to Danish gamers. We can and will play with you regardless of language :)

Viking Lodge Game Days will be held in Copenhagen. We have a venue planned in Nørrebro (north district of Copenhagen), which is not official yet.
In 2010 it was at the community center Støberiet and 2011 at the music venue Stengade. Both in inner Nørrebro.

This year we also want it to be in the heart of the city 1) to make transportation easy for all 2) to ensure a great ambiance 3) to give opportunity to all participants to have a good time after gaming, without too much fuzz.

While Nørrebro might have a perceived bad criminal reputation this is very exaggerated and newcomers will experience a lively and friendly neighborhood.

I'm curious about what language you use at the table. I have no idea if the Pathfinder books have been translated into Danish, but I have a strong suspicion that the PFS scenarios are not. When you run games in Denmark, are the players all English speaking, or do you translate things on the fly?

If you do game in English, does the language barrier hinder your attempts to find players at all? If not, what challenges do you face trying to translate things yourself?

Pathfinder RPG has not yet been translated into Danish (at least not as far I know).

I can only speak for myself and the 5 players in my Pathfinder Society group, of course, but when we get together to play RPGs (whether it's Pathfinder RPG or any other RPG), we speak Danish. Game mechanics and flavor text are done in English. For instance, Armor Class is Armor Class and not rustningsklasse as it would be if we translated it into Danish.

The same goes here. We are 6 players and a GM. We use Danish for normal conversation with a heavy dose of English mixed in. English is a second language for most danes - especially the younger generation. We could just as well play entirely in English, and have done so when we have had foreign visitors.

We generally run games in Danish. Often we choose to read flavor texts aloud in English but more often than not we translate them on the fly or just paraphrase them. Of course GMs should always make notes about key information.

This is how things have shaped out in Finland's PFS scene as well. Perhaps it's not surprising given that the level of English comprehension is similar in Finland and Denmark, but it's interesting to see that our PFS communities, which are practically isolated, have converged at the same solutions.

For myself at least, making some mental notes regarding how to translate flavor texts (and those names that I think should be translated) is a part of preparing for running a scenario. It's a bit of extra work, but you develop a routine pretty fast, and it makes you actually read through the text with some thought. What you lose in the eloquence of the flavor texts, you can often make up in liveliness.

We also use English words for terms that are specific to the game mechanics, like Armor Class. This is actually quite convenient, as it allows players to emphasize that it's the rules-related term that they are referring to.

I just have to say that we are having a lot of fun playing PFSOP in Denmark and the energy and dedication Diego has put into it is a big part of it. I regards to the language debate I can't believe that none of you danes have mentioned that we play in "Danglish", because that is the only proper name of the language we use (and have used since the beginning of D&D in DK).

I'll second the notion that the Viking Lodge Game Days, planned for July 28–29, are the best for foreigners to visit, as they are the easiest to to combine with a night out in Copenhagen. The tradition was actually started because Joshua J. Frost wanted to visit us, so it's been foreign friendly from the start, and it would be awesome to have foreign guests become a regular part of the Viking Lodge Game Days.

As a side note, it was at the Game Days i 2010 that I managed to become the only GM ever to kill off Joshua J. Frost's character in a PFSOP game. The first thing he did when he got back to Seattle was to retire the scenario (The Third Riddle) :)

You think you could do better in Copenhagen, Michael Brock? (nudge, nudge, dare, dare)

Just managed to get around to reading this. Great article, Diego. I've been wanting to visit Denmark for a long time and this has just redoubled my desire. Now. How to manage a stop over in Copenhagen on a flight to the UK...

I want to sincerely thank all of my hosts while here in Copenhagen. Almost every waking hour, I have had a local PFS player showing me around. I don't want to thank people individually for fear of forgetting anyone. But, I have much thanks for showing me around Copenhagen, both on a bike and a boat, a trip to Roskilde to see Viking ships and riding in one, the chapel in Roskilde where 20 kings and 19 queens are buried, the trip to Christiana, the BBQ and game of PFS my first full day here, and all the other welcoming events that were planned at the behest of Venture-Captain Diego Winterborg. Even part of either early morning sent at Louise's bar was net resting in its own way. It was even an awesome experience to have Henrik in a black suit holding a large photo of my Decemvirate avatar when I first arrived and exited my plane so I new exactly who I was looking for. I was able to see and experience things I never would have without the time volunteered b the local player base. It is truly, truly appreciated that you opened your heart, your time and your city to me to make me feel welcome. I'm looking forward to the convention today and tomorrow, and continuing to watch PFS thrive and grow in Denmark.

First game of the convention complete! I GMed an awesome table of players through #3-EX. They all seemed to enjoy the game and were kind enough to speak English the entire game. It was a very enjoyable experience for me.

Being apart of the danish PFS community, even thought I was unable to attend until Sunday, I have to thank all involved in the planning of Viking Lodge Summer Games.

People were tired and wasted when I met them Sunday morning however most were up for the challenge, as the rest of the day was executed to perfection with plenty of epic moments.

Even when planning went a bit off track others stepped up and got a table running. A table I luckily had the pleasure of being a part of. It was outstanding.

All in all a huge thanks to all involved hosts, GMs and players alike.
And a special thanks Mike for spending a few days in our little part of the world. Unfortunately I did not get a chance to say hi myself, I know it has mend a lot to everyone that you stopped by for the Summer Games.